In the Days of Auld Lang Syne: Charmed Life
by stilljustceci
Summary: The first time I met Mary Louise Brandon, sitting framed by green in that window at Meadowview, I knew somehow that she would change my life. JPOV for ItDoALS. Jasper x Alice, AH AU.
1. Chapter 1

1.

_The first time I met Mary Louise Brandon, sitting framed by green in that window at Meadowview, I knew somehow that she would change my life. Actually, that's not entirely true. I think _she_ knew that she would change my life. And she let me know about it in no uncertain terms._

Meadowview is a beautiful place, all pine trees and pointed little turrets, sitting in those soft blue-green hills almost like a castle. I like to think it looks like a home. I know it's not what most would call a happy and comfortable place, but those who trust their loved ones to its red brick walls are trusting me to help take good care of them. So I try to take care of them as though they were my family.

It's not always an easy job. When I first started working there, I guess I did expect it to be easy. Things have always been easy for me: family, friends, school, girls. Now, I'm not trying to be arrogant. In fact, I'd have more to be arrogant about if I'd actually had to work for anything in my life. I'd have more to be proud of. You know. I guess, in a way, I've always been looking for a challenge.

Working at Meadowview Psychiatric Hospital is a challenge. Mary Louise is a challenge.

I walked into Meadowview that first day with my head full of symptoms and treatments and psychobabble and my heart full of a grad student's idealistic confidence. I'd been trailing Cathy, the Head Nurse, for a couple of hours longer than was really necessary to understand the routines and the rules. My aural memory is damn near perfect, you see. Again, I'm not trying to brag. I inherited it from my father and have never put it to much more use than being good at school without actually studying, playing half a dozen instruments without being accomplished on any of them, and being embarrassingly good at trivia games.

Anyhow, there was a disturbance down the hall and Cathy left me with Mae to watch over a small group of patients in the rec room. Mary Louise was at a table in the corner by the window, graceful and delicate and lovely, even in her near colorless hospital-approved clothing, her lips faded and chapped, her hair frizzy from institutional shampoo. I knew she couldn't have been more than forty five, maybe fifty years old, but she was aged by this place. Aged by her illness, perhaps. She was folding strips of shiny magazine pages and humming to herself. I watched her for a few minutes until she set down a perfect little frog, sunny yellow and speckled with bits of colorful letters and logos. With a distant, wistful smile, she flicked a finger down behind its arched back and it leaped several inches across the table's surface. She looked up when she heard me laugh, and her face went slack for a moment before she suddenly beamed at me like a child.

That smile made my heart stutter strangely, and in an anxious rush to hide my strange reaction – mostly from myself - I stepped closer to her, and gestured toward the frog. "May I?"

"No!" she cried and grabbed hold of my wrist in a strong, warm-fingered grip. "Not yet!"

I could sense Mae was watching us closely. I gave Mary Louise what I hoped was a reassuring smile. "My name is Jasper, ma'am," I said, bowing slightly and placing my other hand over hers as if her grip on me was a friendly handshake. "And you are?"

She smirked at me. "Not as charming as you, I'm sure." But she released my wrist and dropped her hands back to her lap, paralyzing me with pale gray eyes narrowed, as if she were memorizing me, but I felt uneasily that it wasn't my face she was seeing. I needed to straighten up, to take a step back. But this bedraggled angel was holding my guts in some kind of vice and I couldn't move or think anything further than that I had never met anyone like her. A sudden thought and surge of panic made my pulse race, and I made myself imagine leaning close to kiss her. Her thin lips curled upward as if she somehow knew what I was thinking, and I felt nothing more than a flood of relief that the embarrassed flush on my cheeks was the only blood moving against my wishes.

Just then, Mae cleared her throat and announced that it was lunch time. The other patients stood and began to shuffle their way toward the hallway. I side-stepped and turned, offered Mary Louise my arm. She stood, but then stayed rooted in place, eyes still skimming the air around me, that strange smile tugging at her eyes and mouth. "Come along, Mary Louise. You must be hungry," Mae said, and she took her elbow and led her away.

"I'll see you tomorrow, Custer," Mary Louise called as she waved without looking back.

"It's Jasper, ma'am," I said to her retreating form, feeling awkward for probably the first time in my entire life. I heard her laugh.

I suddenly realized I was standing all by myself in the rec room and shook my head to clear it. I needed to go find… _Cathy._ Sweet Jesus, I'd never forgotten anyone's name before. Ever.


	2. Chapter 2

2.

I let myself into the house late that night after what felt like hours of Intro to Matlab, rolling my neck and grunting a bit as I kicked off my boots into the coat closet. I pressed a speed dial number, tucked my cellphone between my right shoulder and my ear, then promptly turned and tripped over a pair of sneakers in the middle of the entryway.

"God dammit, Emmett, you damned slob." The words were still leaving my mouth when I realized my call had connected, and I cringed.

"Ex_cuse_ me??"

"Oh, Ma… I'm so sorry."

"You must have had a long day," my mother laughed.

"I did," I admitted. "I really should have waited to call you in the morning." I wandered into the kitchen and set my backpack on a chair.

"But I told you to call me tonight. I would have worried, baby. How did your first day go?"

"It was… enlightening." I saw Mary Louise's strange, gray gaze in my mind again, stopped in front of the refrigerator, scrubbed my free hand over my face.

My mother's voice became worried. "Enlightening. What is it, Jasper? Was it not what you expected?"

"No. No, I guess it wasn't," I said slowly, then rushed to add, "But it was perfect, Ma. It's not going to be boring." _I'll see you tomorrow, Custer. _I swung open the refrigerator and took out a beer. "Not boring at all."

"I just want you to be happy, my boy," she said in her Motherly Tone. I could practically feel her hand smoothing over my hair the way she always did when she said that. I even smiled a little as I popped the top off my beer with the cast iron opener bolted into the side of the food pantry. "Jasper Thomas Whitlock, was that a beer you just opened?"

I chuckled. "Yes, Ma. But don't worry. It's a Shiner Bock."

She laughed again. "That's my boy. I guess you have homework to do?"

"Always," I sighed. "Thank you, Ma. I love you. Goodnight."

"Goodnight. I love you, baby."

I pressed 'End,' tipped the beer up to my mouth, and drank it all down in long, loud swallows, then dropped the empty brown bottle in the recycle bin.

Emmett came shuffling in just then in his underwear. "Yo, Jasper," he said, with a two-finger forehead salute.

I belched at him and swung the fridge door open again.

"Hey, get me one of those, too."

"Jackass, I tripped over your stinkin' sneakers again," I grumbled, and handed him a bottle of Red Hook.

"Did ya pick 'em up? S'what I keep you around for, woman. Damn."

I grinned, shook my head, popped my beer top, and grabbed my backpack. "I figured I'd just leave 'em out there for Edward to find."

Emmett grumbled and headed for the entryway. "Okay, okay. Oh, by the way," he hollered as I was going up the stairs, taking them two at a time. "Edward got us a New Year's Eve gig. PAR-TAY!" I heard his sneakers thump against the inside walls of the closet.

An Edward gig. That sounded… last minute. I turned right at the top of the stairs and headed for Edward's room.

***

"A costume party at the _Unicorn_?" I stared at Edward like he'd grown an extra head.

"SHH!" he poked his head out the door with a panicked expression.

I snorted. "You didn't tell Emmett, did you."

"Would _you_?"

"Hell, no."

Edward's caterpillar eyebrows did that puppy dog thing.

"Oh, HELL, no. I can't handle it when he cries."

"You're a shrink!"

"Not doin' it."

He raked a hand through his hair. "Fine. Will you go to the costume shop with us tomorrow, though?"

"Sure," I said, and clapped him on the back as I slipped past him. "Good luck. And stay outta arms' reach, man. He's drinking."

***

After two hours of homework, I was starting to have a hell of a time concentrating and decided to call it quits and head to bed. The house was dark and quiet. I hoped Emmett hadn't killed Edward in a power bar fueled temper tantrum over having been fooled into thinking we were actually going to a respectable New Year's Eve party. I wouldn't have admitted it to my roommates- they were both running on some pretty serious macho trips, if on different ends of the macho spectrum- but a costume party sounded fun. It was fascinating seeing what costumes people chose for themselves, and how differently they behaved behind the makeup and the masks.

I settled down on my bed with my acoustic guitar in my lap, head propped back against the headboard and eyes closed, and let my fingers pick out a random melody as my mind wandered. It was usually the only way I could relax enough to fall asleep after a long day, and today had been a challenging one. I let a half-smile flit over my face in the dark.

_Meadowview._ I hadn't lied to my mother. I wasn't sure I'd be a star employee there, that the patients would automatically all fall into line and interact with me according to my memorized textbook knowledge and my killer charm and instinct, that I wouldn't walk out of those old-fashioned double doors after every single shift in the same befuddled, excited state I'd left that afternoon. Cathy had actually pulled me aside and told me that Mae was worried. She'd asked me what happened with Mary Louise Brandon and I hadn't been sure how to answer. I'd stammered and finally said that she reminded me of someone, someone who had passed, and I'd felt guilty and relieved at once when Cathy's expression had shifted to pity and understanding. I had promised I wouldn't let it affect my performance. I had lied. Embellished, even.

But it felt wonderful, almost romantic. It was as if every turquoise-and-tan room, every Bookman font chart on every white plastic clipboard, every medication-fogged expression was a puzzle for me to solve, a hurdle for me to jump.

And Mary Louise. Mary Louise Brandon was a conundrum to unravel. She didn't remind me of anyone. How could she? I slid my fingers down on the neck of my guitar to play lower, slower chords that matched the frown I felt pull my brows together.

The important question was what exactly it was she had made me feel. Why could come later. First, I had to decide if Cathy and Mae were right to have been worried about me.

I opened my eyes and looked down at my fingers, started to sing under my breath.

_You tell me that you've got everything you want,  
And your bird can sing,  
But you don't get me, You don't get me._

_You say you've seen seven wonders, And your bird is green,  
But you can't see me, You can't see me._

I thought about that first flash of panic, that fear that I might be attracted to her. Sexually attracted to a patient. To a woman my Mama's age. I'd denied it at the time, but why else would my heart have raced like that? So I pondered it. I needed to know. It wasn't too late to request a transfer.

My guitar fell quiet. I closed my eyes and took a deep breath and pictured Mary Louise's face. She was lovely, to be sure. But… no matter how I tried, I could conjure up no fantasy of stolen kisses or secret caresses. She looked like an angel, I thought. Like a fallen angel, trying to remember, trying to understand where she was and why she'd lost her wings. But the expression on her face when she'd smiled at me- it was as if _she_ had recognized _me_.

A sudden pounding on the door scared me so bad I almost threw my guitar off the bed.

"What the fuck?" I shouted.

"Are you asleep yet?" Emmett. I swear to Jesus… "You're not whacking off, are you? I can come back."

"What do you want," I relented, getting up to set my guitar aside before Emmett managed somehow to destroy it after all.

He opened the door and leaned on the doorjamb with his arms crossed over his chest defensively. "Whitlock, dude. You gotta help me. Tell Edward we had plans. Let's go to The Red Bar and get drunk. You gotta back me up here, man."

I chuckled. "I already talked to him, Emmett. Give it a chance. It'll be fun."

"It's called the _Unicorn_. Have you seen the place?"

"No, I haven't. But, c'mon. Get out. I need some sleep." I used the door to push him back out into the hallway.

"I'll remember this, Whitlock!" he grumbled. "Put that damn guitar away and spank the monkey once in a while before you turn into a woman!" His voice raised in volume and pissiness as I closed the door in his face, chuckling.

*** ***

Lyrics from "And Your Bird Can Sing" by The Beatles, from the album "Revolver," 1966.


	3. Chapter 3

3.

_I was sitting astride a palomino horse, with a spiral notebook balanced on his white-blonde mane, trying my damnedest to take legible notes despite my military-issue white leather gloves. Mr. Prater was speaking in his usual enthusiastic tenor as his dust-yellowed hand flew over the green chalkboard. "__George Armstrong Custer__ was an Army officer and cavalry commander in the American Civil War and the Indian Wars. He first notably served at the First Battle of Bull Run on July 21, 1861."_

"_And then he got his ass killed by an Indian," smirked a nasal female voice beside me. I glanced down to my right as my horse side-stepped left. Lauren Mallory was wearing her pep squad blue-and-gold, her glittery pink pen cap slowly deforming between her teeth. The other students snickered. Like me, they were wearing Civil War era Union blues, which did, oddly enough, match Lauren's cropped top and swishy little skirt. They were all slouched in standard student desks, however, and I reined in my horse, trying to calm him in the cramped space._

_Mr. Prater didn't react to her language or her attitude. He simply turned away from the board, wagging his finger. "Not quite yet, Miss Mallory. First, he established a reputation as an aggressive cavalry brigade commander willing to take personal risks. His Michigan Brigade was known as the Wolverines and they fought in every major campaign from the Battle of Gettysburg until the Confederacy's surrender in 1865. Custer played a key role in that campaign - the Appomattox Campaign." He turned to spell that on the board, and someone behind me popped their gum. "His division blocked General Lee's retreat on its final day, and it was Custer who received the Flag of Truce at Lee's surrender."_

_My pen ran out of ink and I scribbled in the margin of my notes, trying to get it flowing again. Mr. Prater stepped over as I was licking the ballpoint. I chuckled, embarrassed, and lowered the spent pen._

"_Did you know Custer graduated last in his class at West Point?" he asked me._

_I nodded my head because, actually, I did know that. It occurred to me that I only knew it because I'd heard this very lecture before, back in high school, in Mr. Prater's class. I wondered why I was dreaming about it now. Then I remembered Mary Louise. _I'll see you tomorrow, Custer.

_Mr. Prater continued, "He didn't let that slow him down though. By the end of the Civil War, he'd been promoted to Major General of Volunteers."_

_There was a look of bemused pride on his face. _He loves the underdog_, I thought. _When you start at the top, there's nothing to do but disappoint people, but the underdog? The underdog is a hero just for being in the race_._

"_But, as Miss Mallory already pointed out, that doesn't change the fact that he was defeated and killed at the Battle of the Little Bighorn-" He returned to the board and his chalk resumed its scratching. "Also known as Custer's Last Stand, in 1876 during the Indian Wars, by a coalition of Native American tribes composed mostly of Sioux, Cheyenne, and Arapaho, and led by the Sioux warrior Crazy Horse and the Sioux leaders Gall and Sitting Bull."_

_The bell rang just then and my mount reared, almost unseating me. My notebook fluttered away as I fought the reins and then suddenly, Lauren's hands were on the bridle, stroking the horse's nose, calming him with a gentle voice. I started to thank her, but she gasped and jerked, and slumped to the floor, one pale hand curled around a quivering arrow. I leaped down out of the saddle, heart racing even faster now, and knelt beside her. Her clothing faded to gray around the growing stain of blood on her shirt and the desks behind her were only a narrow Meadowview bed. I lifted her onto the comforter and straightened her limbs as gently as I could as I called for help._

"_Mary Louise," I whispered. "I'm sorry." Then I pulled out the arrow, tried not to watch her face crumple with the pain of it. Tears slid down to darken her hair and drip into her ears. Cathy appeared next to me and shouldered me aside. She was holding a syringe. "It's just for the pain," I said as Cathy eased the needle into Mary Louise's thin, fragile skin. I hoped they didn't hear my voice shaking._

"_I know," she whispered back. "I know you'll take care of me, Custer. You'll always take care of me."_

_I nodded, then her eyelids began to droop, and I smoothed her mussed hair on the white pillowcase. The blood was gone, the arrow was gone, only the tears remained. Cathy was watching me, lingering squint-eyed in the hallway. I could feel her stare. I felt doubt tugging at me too, like a child asking for attention. I had just promised I'd take care of her._

_But Custer lost. In the end, Custer always lost._

It's Jasper, ma'am,_ I said to Cathy, but her expression didn't change. I turned and repeated it to Mary Louise, whispered my name in her ear, and she smiled in her sleep. I smoothed her hair again._ My name is Jasper.

***

Edward's footfalls pounding in the hallway and his voice, sharp with panic, woke me up that morning with a rush of adrenaline that had me up, out of bed, and downstairs in less than a minute. It turned out the mid-morning news was covering a fire: the Red Bar, our Boys' Night destination, our home away from home. Shit. By the time we got there, there was nothing left of it but a charred wooden skeleton and a smoldering junkyard of blackened rubble, the whole thing still sweating white smoke into the sky. It took a lot on my part and Edward's both to keep Emmett calm, especially after Tanya's theatrical display of grief, even with a greasy late breakfast at the Howl at the Moon. Poor Emmett. His emotions ran so strong and always right there on the surface. Of course, that was better than Edward's tendency to wad them up and tuck them down deep where I wasn't sure he ever looked at them again. At least not voluntarily. They both seemed wound up so tight lately.

I finished off the last lukewarm swallow of my coffee and shook my head at the owner, Sally, before she could cross the room with the steaming pot to refill it. Maybe the fire was a good thing. A great big, unsubtle sign from the The Powers That Be that we all needed a little change. Not to mention New Year's Eve was tomorrow, and that just made it more meaningful to me. I'm not an overly superstitious sort but New Year's Eve is special. Where I choose to be, and whom I choose to spend it with… it's always symbolic to me. I'd been looking forward to a night with the boys, since I couldn't be with my family; the place hadn't really mattered, but now, with the Red Bar and our Boys' Nights in the metaphorical ashtray, I wondered if there might be something more to the Unicorn and this last minute gig.

Or maybe not. Somehow, I didn't think a bar called the Unicorn was going to become our new Boys' Night hangout. I'd heard the new owner was one of those old money, high-maintenance blondes. That just wasn't our scene. Not that Tanya and her sisters were our type either, at least not where dating was concerned. But they shot a mean game of pool, they could toss back tequila like champs, and they were sincere and dependable and fun. What could we expect from the Unicorn? Good drinks (I hoped), lousy pool tables (if any at all), and probably a mostly shallow crowd of gold diggers in acrylic nails and designer shoes, I predicted gloomily.

Then again, I'd been wrong before.

I glanced at my watch as Edward finished up a phone call and started to slide out of the booth. Emmett jumped up. "Gotta go drain the main vein. I'll catch up in a sec." He jogged across the diner, almost running over poor Sally on the way. She scowled at him with a twinkle in her eye and he winked as he skirted around her and then disappeared into a side hallway.

"Let's go check out that club for my gig," Edward said, and grabbed the check.

I lifted my eyebrows at him. "I have to go to work in a while," I said. "Costumes?"

Edward sighed and tugged at the bangs straggling out from under his black beanie onto his forehead. "Right. I'd forgotten. Damn. This is important, but it won't take long. Maybe we can get the costumes tomorrow?"

I one-shoulder shrugged. "Long as they're open. I'm off work tomorrow." I looked over at him as he handed the check and his card to the cashier with his head still hung low. "You okay, man?"

"Yeah, I'm fine." He lifted his chin then and granted the cashier one of his patent pending crooked grins. At least, I'm assuming that's what happened. I was standing mostly behind him, but as if on cue, the poor girl turned pink from neckline to hairline and knocked over the pen cup by the register. I chuckled and shook my head as I knelt to help her clean up the mess, but decided to let him get away with the distraction. By the time she'd recovered enough to hand him his card and receipt, Emmett was back and we headed out to the car.

***

The Unicorn wasn't what I expected, all things considered. In fact, I'd say it was rather full of surprises. For example, I wasn't expecting a bouncer, if that's what the enormous Native American kid at the door was; he was wearing a bar back's apron and a baby face, but all I could think when I saw him was, "You ARE the Brute Squad." I wasn't expecting the cool second story wrap-around either, or the warm lighting, or the real wood furnishings everywhere. Not a hint of pink neons or mirrored glass or pretentious art prints on the walls. The bar was especially nice. Obviously expensive and meticulously clean. Well-stocked. Classy.

And then, the most pleasant surprise of all, the bartender appeared from under the bar with a double handful of top-shelf bottles, all spiky black hair and pointed little gamine features. She turned her back to me, bounced up the two steps of a footstool, and leaned forward to put the bottles in their places.

And I checked out her ass. Classy.

*** ***

Mr. Prater's lecture paraphrased from Wikipedia's entries on "George Armstrong Custer" and "Michigan Brigade."


	4. Chapter 4

4.

After our visit to the Unicorn, I found myself excited about the New Year's Eve party, though I knew neither Emmett nor Edward felt the same. Even the heavy rain that pelted me for half the ride out to Meadowview didn't dampen my spirits. I'd had to keep the speedometer down below 50 so the fat drops didn't bore holes in my skin, and a glance at my watch as I parked my motorcycle way out in the employee lot told me I'd better hurry. I jogged to the shelter of the entrance canopy before pulling off my helmet and shaking as much water as I could from my backpack and jacket. I made a mental note to get Emmett to lend me his Jeep from now on as I hurried to the employee restroom to get into some dry clothes.

Cathy was at the main hospital taking care of transfer paperwork, but Paula and Mae were in good spirits. They didn't give me grief for being late, only made fun of me for thinking I could ride a motorcycle around Washington, and we fell into an easy routine for the first part of the afternoon. The sound of the downpour against the turreted roof of the building seemed to have most of the patients in contemplative moods. Mary Louise was mostly unresponsive, sitting in her vinyl recliner next to the window in her room and staring out at the afternoon storm, knees drawn up to her chest, lips and fingers moving vaguely in silent self-communication. I wasn't sure if she recognized me or cared about my presence, but I made sure to volunteer to administer the meds along her hallway when it was time, and I told her about my ride in the rain, and the party coming up, and about Paula's new perm. I didn't tell her about my Custer dream.

Her neighbor, an elderly man named George, had to be sedated just before dinner, and I knew I was being watched for signs of anxiety over the scene, but aside from a small bruise on my forearm from an unblocked punch, I was fine. George's quiet, gentle little wife came around soon to visit with him. She did not touch him, but sat beside his bed and read to him from a tattered, old romance novel. I made excuses to keep passing by that room the whole hour she was in there with her voice burbling out into the hallway like water over river rocks.

It was nearly time for me to head back home, and I was feeling tired despite the early evening hour, so I quietly checked on the patients as they relaxed, digesting their roast beef and vegetables. At the far end of Mary Louise's hall, I saw someone in the unassigned room there: a young man slouched in a wooden visitor's chair just inside the door. A cloud of sadness hung all around him as gray and chilling as the weather outside, and I stopped for that reason more than for the odd fact that he was visiting an empty room.

He looked up at me when I cleared my throat, and I ventured, "There anything I can help you with?"

He smiled one of those smiles that just made the held-back tears pool up on his lower lashes. "I just came to… I don't know. See the place."

He stood up, shoved his hands in his pockets, and took a deep breath. "Mae let me in. Is that all right?"

I chuckled. "Hey, I'm the newbie around here. You're fine." I leaned on the doorjamb and put my hands in my own pockets and waited him out for a moment.

Sure enough, he started talking. "So, you didn't get to meet Leah?" I shook my head, and he went on. "She was here for six years. Since a little after Emily turned one. Our daughter. We weren't married, and her family wouldn't let me come here to see her. I kept thinking she was going to get better. Get where the medication would be enough, you know? But at the same time, I was scared. I didn't want her to come home, even though I never stop thinking about her. The reason they brought her here was because she'd been hurting Emily. That was why I had to take custody. It's not like I was trying to take her away from them. I was just protecting her. I had to." His chin twitched once, and he tipped it up, fixed his eyes on a fluorescent light panel. "Anyway, that brain bleed got 'er today, so..." He took a deep breath, took his hands out of his pockets to rake them both through his shoulder-length black hair. "Thanks. And good luck with the job." He glanced down along the hallway. "Must be a real challenge."

And then he walked away toward the elevators, his head high, shoulders squared. _Not like yours,_ I thought. I remembered how I'd been wishing for a challenge yesterday and felt foolish.

I finished my rounds and went to clock out right at 8, more eager to get home than I would have wished. I was almost to the elevators with my backpack over one shoulder when I heard Mary Louise's voice behind me and turned to see her straining against Paula's arms, calling after me, "Custer! Custer, no, don't go! It's all wrong! Custer!" The elevator chimed then, but I didn't even look at it before turning back.

Mae smiled at me and called, "We'll be alright, Jasper. Next shift is starting, and Noah's coming in. You look tired. Go on home."

Mary Louise seemed to be relaxing already, her eyes still on me. "See you tomorrow?" she asked in a child's voice.

"Day after, Ms. Brandon. I'll be here. Sure as the sun shines, even behind the clouds," I assured her, feeling strangely guilty as I stepped backward toward the elevator and pressed the button again to get it to come back. "And Happy New Year to you." And she smiled at me.

Oddly enough, in the elevator on the way down I found myself thinking about the little black-haired bartender and her tight little purple pants and wondering if she'd be in costume tomorrow night. I wondered what a hot little freak like her wore to costume parties when she was on the clock. I wondered if it would be different if she were off the clock.

Not so oddly, my thoughts as I rumbled home going 25 miles per hour below the speed limit in the steady rain were not about her, but rather about the man in Leah's room and his eyes full of pain and strength. By the time I got back to the house and trudged inside, leaving a puddle path all the way up the stairs and into the bathroom to run a hot shower, I felt completely emo and ridiculous. I glanced into my office at the desk covered in books and decided to just leave it all 'til morning.

Forty-five minutes later when I was strumming my guitar on my bed with the lights off and my eyes closed, I couldn't seem to settle into a song and my fingers felt restless on the frets. I was way above tempo and tripping through a bunch of crazy fugues on Willie Nelson so I finally stopped, swiveled my head and rolled my shoulders, trying to relax. I played a few scales, deliberately slow, then started again.

_Cowboys like smoky old pool rooms and clear mountain mornings,  
Little warm puppies and children and girls of the night.  
And them that don't know him won't like him,  
And them that do sometimes won't know how to take him.  
He ain't wrong, he's just different,  
but his pride won't let him do things to make you think he's right._

I was chuckling at myself for the melodramatic melancholy when Edward's voice pulled my attention toward the door. "Emo cowboy, Jasper? Really?"

I made a mental note to put bells on the knob. Or a lock. "I know, I know. Emmett read me the riot act last night. I'm actually thinking jerking off would be a better idea tonight, but you'd have to leave."

"Is something wrong?"

"Just… had a rough day at work. I'll be fine. But thank you."

"You know, everybody likes you, Jasper. Even creepy old Mr. Emerson on the corner likes you, and he hates everybody."

I laughed outright. "Maybe I wasn't singing about myself," I said, and set my guitar aside.

Edward looked confused. "Oh. Okay." But he finally left.

Truth was, I didn't know who the hell I was singing about. I didn't even know why I was feeling so down. Because I had a good life, free of drama? Maybe I was just bored. Maybe I was afraid that the supposed most interesting years of my life were wrapping up and soon I'd be in a depressing career and bored with it before it even started.

Maybe I was lonely. It had been a long time. My last girlfriend, Ana Maria, was more than a little bit on the scary side. I won't lie. She was part of the reason I applied for grad school in Washington, almost as far away from Dallas as I could get without leaving the country altogether. And she was more than part of the reason my dates since then had been not only casual but few and far between. Alas, the same fiery temper that had made me finally run away from her was what had attracted me in the first place. Her flashing dark eyes, and those sinfully full lips no one but me could make smile. And talk about a firecracker in the sack. There were a few times I'd even faked being sick because I didn't have the emotional energy for sex with her. Too bad she loved to fight outside of the bedroom as well.

Yeah, that wasn't helping me get in the mood to pop the weasel. I cleared my head and focused instead on some old standards: Angelina, Ashley Greene. Angelina and Ashley Greene together. They were starting to do the trick when I realized their names all started with A. Ana Maria, Angelina, Ashley Greene. That was really bizarre. I'd never heard of an alphabet fetish before. I wondered if there was a porn website devoted to it where I could get off to images of Annabelle Anderson in an alligator skin anorak. Ooh, an Asian Annabelle Anderson in an alligator skin anorak. With A cups.

I fell asleep without having masturbated but with laughter on my lips, and so, all in all, I'd call that good day.

***

Lyrics from "Mamas Don't Let Your Babies Grow Up to be Cowboys" by Waylon Jennings and Willie Nelson, from the album "Waylon and Willie," 1978.

***

Lyrics from "Mamas Don't Let Your Babies Grow Up to be Cowboys" by Waylon Jennings and Willie Nelson, from the album "Waylon and Willie," 1978.


End file.
